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Did you know that over two-thirds of couples experience a significant decline in the quality of their relationship after having children? 

Yet despite being a hugely common problem, this issue isn’t often talked about — which can lead many parents to feel alone in their struggles.

That’s why we’re tackling this issue head-on in our latest episode, featuring the exceptional Sara Stone, a renowned sex and relationship coach.

Press play to discover: how to re-establish intimacy with your partner after babies, reclaiming your sexuality when you’re a mama, the secret to maintaining passion when you’re in a long-term relationship, what to do when it feels like your sex drive has vanished, the surprising skill that can save your relationship, how to prioritize intimacy when life feels full, creative solutions to move through conflict, and why you should do a ‘health check’ for your relationship.

If you refuse to believe that your best sex is behind you simply because you’ve had kids or have been with your partner a long time, then press play now… This eye-opening episode is for you.

About Sara Stone

Sara Stone is a couples’ sex and relationship coach and educator. Her expertise lies in supporting parents to recreate the relationship they had before having kids.

Sara has curated and facilitated over 100 highly regarded events and programs, helping thousands of people to heal past relationship wounds, rediscover their sensuality, and infuse their relationships with a profound sense of reverence.

In this episode we chat about:

• How she helps people tap into their sexual potential (4:43)
• Why the best sex of your life is NOT behind you (6:33)
• Reclaiming your sexual energy after babies (7:57)
• How to reignite your passion and keep the flame burning in a long-term relationship (18:23)
• Why connection *outside* the bedroom is crucial for connection *in* it (32:35)
• How to navigate one partner having a higher libido than the other (36:08)
• Untethering from the Madonna/Whore complex (and how it can impact relationships) (40:46)

Episode resources:

• SheLaunch (join here)
• Mastering Your Mean Girl by Melissa Ambrosini (book)
• Open Wide by Melissa Ambrosini (book)
• Comparisonitis by Melissa Ambrosini (book)
• Time Magic by Melissa Ambrosini and Nick Broadhurst (book)
• Betty Martin (website)
• The Art of Receiving and Giving: The Wheel of Consent by Betty Martin (book)
• Pussy: A Reclamation by Regena Thomashauer (book)
• Sara Stone (blog)
• Sara Stone (Instagram)

Prefer To Read?

The following transcript has been automatically generated and not checked for accuracy.

Melissa: [00:00:00] In episode 545 with Sarah Stone, we are talking about sex after kids, sex in long term partnerships, and how to have the best sex of your life, plus so much more. Welcome to the Melissa Ambrosini Show. I’m your host, Melissa, bestselling author of Mastering Your Mean Girl, open wide, comparisonitis. And I’m here to remind you that love is sexy, healthy is liberating, and wealthy isn’t a dirty word.

Each week, I’ll be getting up close and personal with thought leaders from around the globe, as well as your weekly dose of motivation so that you can create epic change in your own life and become the best version of yourself 

Sara: possible. Are 

Melissa: you ready, beautiful? Hey beautiful, and welcome back to the show.

I am so excited about this episode because Nick and I have personally [00:01:00] worked with Sarah and she is amazing. And for those of you that have never heard of Sarah, she is a couple’s sex and relationship coach and educator. Her expertise lies in supporting parents to recreate the relationship they had before having kids.

And that is when Nick and I reached out to her about a year after giving birth to Bambi. Now she has curated and facilitated over a hundred highly regarded events and programs Helping thousands of people to heal past relationship wounds rediscover their sensuality, and infuse their relationship with a profound sense of reverence.

She currently runs workshops and hens parties specifically tailored for women, focusing on teaching techniques to pleasure their partners and cultivate deep connections with their significant other. I have actually been to a hens party where Sarah did one of her workshops and it was So informative, hilarious, and the best fun.

Now, she also supports couples through [00:02:00] transformational coaching programs, aiding them in managing emotions and conflict, communicating desires and needs effectively, and experiencing the most fulfilling and meaningful sex of their lives. She employs a multifaceted approach, drawing from the Gottman Method interventions.

Emotionally focused couples, therapy tools, coaching techniques, and personalized semantic practices. This comprehensive toolkit addresses the unique needs of each couple, fostering an environment for healing and profound intimacy. Her work is incredible. It has transformed my relationship with Nick. We have such a deeper, more intimate connection, and it is just powerful and very important work, especially after having kids.

So for everything that we mention in today’s episode, you can check out in the show notes, and that’s over at melissarambrosini. com forward slash 545. And [00:03:00] guys, you will want to get your pen and paper out for this one. It is such a note taker. Let’s dive in.

Beautiful. Sarah, welcome to the show. I’m so excited to have you here. But before we dive in, can you tell us what you had for breakfast this 

Sara: morning? Mmm. It is very early here and I have not had breakfast yet. I’m not a wake up and eat kind of gal. So I would definitely have breakfast after the show and I’m likely just going to have plain old avocado on toast.

Oh, delicious, 

Melissa: babe. Delicious. Well, I’m so pumped to have you here. Just to give a little bit of backstory to everyone. I was one day getting an organic facial with one of our mutual friends. And she was telling me about this girl called Sarah and all of the work that she was doing, her and her husband were doing with you, and how it was just deepening their relationship and I was blown [00:04:00] away.

So as I was leaving, I grabbed your number and I instantly got in touch with you and Nick and I started doing some one on one sessions with you. Now this was about one year postpartum. And as you know, you’ve got a baby as well, your first baby, things shift after having babes. And if you aren’t aware of it, and if you aren’t conscious of it, it can literally fade out and fizzle out.

And for Nick and I, that was definitely not what we wanted. That’s why we had a couple of sessions with you individually and together. And it really was so powerful for us. And I’ve always wanted to have you on the podcast since having those sessions with you. So I’m so glad that we’re finally here, but tell us, babe, have you always been doing this work?

Did you know when you were little that you wanted to do this sort of work, helping people discover their full sexual potential in themselves and in their relationship? Like, how did this all come about 

Sara: for you? [00:05:00] Um, such a good question. Definitely not something that I saw myself doing. It started at a women’s wellness festival about, I don’t know, maybe like eight years ago now.

And I just put my name down to volunteer, went down to Melbourne by myself, went to this Seven Sisters Festival actually. And I just like went to all of these different workshops at the festival and. In two of the workshops that were focused around like sensual and sexual embodiment, I ended up having a full body orgasm and I was like, what the hell was that

I had no idea that was even a thing, but it was almost like this soul calling. You know, I went home and I quit uni. I’d only been doing, I think six months at the time in nutrition studying nutrition, and I was like, I don’t think nutrition’s for me, I think I need to follow this path for my own. Healing and empowerment, but also from that beginning, I felt this call to want to share this work with other women.

And so that’s sort of what led me on this path and [00:06:00] like how I’ve shared that has definitely changed a lot over the years and it continues to evolve, but. Yeah. It’s definitely something that I’m so passionate about. And I know in my, in all parts of my being that I am here to share. Well, you 

Melissa: definitely are so embodied, you know, when I speak to you in person and now like you are an embodied woman and you are so confident in your own skin.

And it’s so beautiful to see, like confidence is so sexy. Like you are very, very confident. So. One of the things that you help couples do is you help them have the best sex of their lives. 

Sara: What does that mean? Hmm. I love that. I think when it comes to sex, like, well, we don’t really get taught how to have sex, right?

We just sort of fumble our way through it. A lot of the time we’re learning from things like porn, which is just not an accurate. representation of, you know, how to have sex. So [00:07:00] I think that we tend to fall into these patterns of, you know, the way that we connect, I guess, and not only the way that we connect, but the way that we orgasm and.

Yeah. So for me, the best sex ever is about going a couple of layers deeper and not only, you know, finding new ways to explore pleasure and intimacy together, but to, yeah, I guess feel more connected and feel like our cups are full from that. But then taking another step further, which I, I guess of the journey I’ve been on is, I guess, finding this more spiritual version of that, like connecting to something greater than our human self through the act of making love and through the act of exploring our body and pleasure in our body.

Melissa: I love that so much because so many 

Sara: women 

Melissa: deal with this, and especially you and I have spoken about this, this intimacy after babies. There’s so much I want to ask you about this, but let’s just start with this. Like having a [00:08:00] baby can significantly affect a woman’s relationship with her body, her identity, and her sexual self.

So what advice do you have for a woman navigating this transition? Cause I know for me, like there was so long where I just was like. 

Sara: No one come near me. Yeah. And you’re definitely not alone there. Like it is one of the biggest shifts a women, a woman will ever experience in her whole life. And, you know, it’s such a shift when you have a small child and especially if you’re breastfeeding, you know, that baby is on you.

It is attached to you a lot of the day, you know, for like a good year or two or three, even. And. I guess a lot of women experience something which is often called like being touched out, right? Where they’re like, they’re, they’re just completely touched out. Like they don’t want any more touch. At the end of the day, they’re like, Oh, I’m so glad to get my baby to bed.

And I love them, but also like, I [00:09:00] just need to be in my own space now. And that could be really hard for a man, especially when you’ve come out of that sort of postpartum period where, you know, sex is just off the table. And then all of a sudden it’s not, and the, you know, you want to reconnect and a woman’s just like, no, like, get off me.

Like you said, it’s like. There’s, there’s nothing I could think of that would be worse than just touching me. Like I just need to be in my own space. So I guess the, the first thing that popped up when you said is that what advice do you have is like, if you’re a woman and you’re in that phase of motherhood and you’re listening to this, know that it is not forever, right?

Like those first couple of years, they go so quickly and it is just a. It’s just a phase. And I have to still remind myself this all the time, because I’m one of those people that tend to be a couple of steps ahead of where I actually am. And I have to remind myself to. Slow down and enjoy where I am and not, you know, the grass isn’t always greener on the other side.

So knowing that it’s not forever one, but I [00:10:00] think two, knowing how to slowly come out of that because it is so easy to just stay in that even when our child stops breastfeeding, it’s like we just feel that, that aliveness, that sexuality just feels dead within us while it can. So knowing how to sort of bring that back within you, and I guess also there’s a big piece around communication, learning how to communicate with your partner, learning how to have intimacy without touch, without sex.

Yes. What does that 

Melissa: look like? People are probably listening, going. Intimacy without sex, what does 

Sara: that look like? Well, there’s so many types of intimacy, you know, intimacy without sex can look like just having an amazing conversation, you know, like conversational foreplay is, is a big thing. And I think, especially for women, because when we converse and we talk, it actually Especially in a woman, it helps to release different hormones and chemicals like oxytocin that make us feel relaxed and open and [00:11:00] connected.

So having conversations, even doing things like, I guess without touch, it’s a little bit harder. There’s many ways you can have intimacy. And explore pleasure with touch without penetrative sex, but there is still a lot of ways you can spend quality time together. I think the people that are listening who haven’t heard of two things actually that have just popped up, love languages.

So definitely explore what your love language, because some people’s love language is touch. And if your partner’s love language is touch and you’ve. Touch off the cards, then they may be feeling really, really unloved. Right. And the erotic blueprint as well as a really cool thing to explore, which is sort of like love languages for sex.

So definitely explore them. There’s many ways there’s breathing together. There’s eye gazing. There’s. Yeah. Spending quality time together. And then I think what’s something that’s really, really, really important that people don’t do enough is platonic touch and intimacy. So, I think what can happen is Especially postpartum, a woman can feel pressure to [00:12:00] have sex and Um, you know, a man, she can interpret her man giving her affection with, and maybe she feels his desire in that.

And she can interpret that as he just, he’s touching me because he wants to have sex. And so I’m going to shut down the touch because I’m not available for sex. And then all of a sudden no one’s touching and there’s no, there’s no foreplay, there’s no. Connection and intimacy. And I think once you get to that point, if you’re not consciously trying to get out of that and working on that and talking about it, then, you know, that is definitely a recipe for disconnection and maybe even breakup or divorce.

What I’m 

Melissa: hearing here is crystal clear communication is such a big piece of this. I talk about this in Open Wide. It’s so important. That we practice crystal clear communication. I’m one of those people that like, I can’t go to bed unless I’ve expressed something like, you know, those women that just hold things in for [00:13:00] like weeks or months, and then that resentment builds.

I am not that person to my husband. I’m like, if you’ve said something, I will tell you then and there, like I can’t hide it, I can’t shove it under the carpet. I just have to express it. So crystal clear communication is so important for this piece. It’s sacred. It’s intimate. It’s, you know, you are the most intimate with this person than you are with anyone else.

So it has to be treated delicately. It has to be treated with intimacy. And so I know for Nick and I, having those conversations is very important, but also um, Yeah. After you have children or you have more children, you have to be so intentional with creating the space for you to. And this is something that Nick and I are constantly being reminded of.

We’re like. Oh, yes. Okay. Yes. No, we need to make space for us. We need to make time for us because it’s very easy to just keep going on through [00:14:00] your life and through your days, you know, doing work and tending to the beautiful children. And then you’re like, Hey, what about you guys? And the thing that we need to remember here is your relationship is the foundation of the family.

It is the glue. It is the most important thing. And if that falls apart, then the whole family. And so we need to make this a priority. We need to make our intimacy a priority and our connection and our time together, a 

Sara: priority. A hundred percent. And like you said, extending onto that, like the relationship is the foundation and also our kids are looking at us and learning and like we are their models for intimacy and connection.

Right. And if they’re not seeing like love and intimacy and platonic connection, then. that can be also damaging for them. Yeah, absolutely. And I love what you said about, you’re [00:15:00] not one of those women who can just go to bed with all of these things in her body or unsaid things. And, and I think that’s like a testament to, you know, the work that you’ve done, but also the relationship that you have with Nick as well.

I think the reason a lot of women And men can’t communicate and they leave things, they shove things under the rug and they leave it there for a while is because, well, one, they don’t have the language. They don’t have the tools to be able to communicate that in a way where it’s actually going to be heard.

And two, they don’t feel safe to communicate it because they don’t feel like it’s actually going to be received. And you know, that’s probably because they’re not communicating it in a way that it can be received as well. Communication is absolutely key. And this is just something that really needs to be taught in schools.

I feel like I have a lot of a lot of energy around the fact that we don’t teach this in schools. Like this is one of the most important skills that we can learn as a child is how to communicate properly, you know, how to build solid [00:16:00] foundations through language, through communicating, through being heard, through validating each other, through vulnerability.

All of that stuff is so important and if we haven’t learned that and we weren’t modeled that as kids, then it’s our duty to learn that as an adult so that we can break those generational cycles and so that we can teach our kids how to actually have, you know, true intimacy and, and deep connection and a healthy relationship.

I see that as my duty as a parent. Absolutely. 

Melissa: Two things I wanted to just touch on here that you’ve mentioned. You know, the fact that we’re not taught how to communicate and this absolutely should be taught in schools. It blows my mind. I was chatting to another friend about her daughter is currently being bullied at school.

Bullying, there is absolutely no excuse for it, right? But in this particular school, the teachers just, you know, they don’t intervene. They let the children work it out themselves. And I’m like, Yeah. Yeah. They don’t know how to work it out. They’ve never been taught how to work [00:17:00] it out. It’s our role as parents to help them with conflict resolution.

And so that blew my mind. Like our children are modeling how we resolve things. And so if we’re not teaching them, they’re not getting it in school. So it is our responsibility. So I just wanted to talk to that. And then the other thing about modeling. Yesterday, Nick was down on the floor with Bambi kissing her and, you know, they were just having such a beautiful moment laughing and he is such a beautiful dad.

Like he is so present, he is so soft, he is so loving. It’s so beautiful to watch. That father daughter bond. Cause I have a beautiful relationship with my dad and I just love watching that. And I said to him yesterday, she’s learning from you how to be loved by a man. 

Sara: And 

Melissa: I’ve got full goosebumps. And I said, honey, you’re teaching her what it’s like to be loved by a man.

And he just looked at me and he [00:18:00] was like. Wow. Yeah, you’re right. And we both just like had this moment of like, my gosh, yes, I am teaching her. And it starts with us, like that modeling, they are watching how we interact, how we speak to each other, how we touch each other. You know, all of those things. So it’s our duty.

It really is our duty, but I would love to hear from you. You know, those couples that have been together for a long time and the ones that maybe have had lots of babies, how do we ignite that chemistry after the long term relationships? You know, what, what can we do? What else can we do to really keep that flame 

Sara: burning?

Hmm. I mean, there’s so many things, but touching back on like what you said, even just explaining the sharing that story about Nick with your daughter, it’s like, there’s been so many studies on [00:19:00] relationship and I love, I love reading these. And one of them is around like sex and what makes us available for sex and what.

The couples that have a lot of sex and the couples that don’t have sex, like what is the differences? And essentially it’s all the things that is happening out of the bedroom. You know, it’s like that platonic intimacy that I was talking about. Like, I know for me, if I don’t feel like my emotional intimacy cup, so the conversations and talking about emotions and going deeper than how is your day with my partner, if we haven’t made the time and carved out the time for that, then I’m not going to be available for sex.

Right. Because I, I don’t feel close to him and I’m not just going to open my body sexually to that. I need something more, you know, that often doesn’t happen because we make sure we carve the time out. But it’s like, again, the platonic intimacy cuddles on the couch, making sure that the other person.

Feels loved and, and knows that you appreciate them. You know, appreciation goes a really long way. You know, a lot of people don’t feel appreciated and seen in their, in [00:20:00] their relationship. So it’s all of the things that happen outside of the bedroom are like, one thing that I do with my clients, it’s like if there’s a.

Pain of glass between you, if there’s a window between you and your partner, like how clean is that window? Right. And, and the dirt on the window being all of the resentment, the unsaid things, the unmet needs, you know, because when that glass is dirty, there’s not a clear path to sex. There’s like, you’re not open to that.

And especially as a woman, like our sexual response is different to a man. Like there’s been studies around this as well, that a woman. Before she actually allows herself to go to follow the arousal. So she might feel arousal in her body before she actually allows herself to follow that arousal. She is scanning her environment, AKA her relationship for safety.

Is it safe for me to follow that? You know, is it safe for me to go into that and to, to open myself to that because I guess, you know, on a [00:21:00] biological level, like women have had to create that in within their system because it’s not as safe as it was more vulnerable for a woman to open sexually because we’re allowing ourself to be penetrated by a man, someone to enter our body, which is, is vulnerable, right?

So yeah, I think safety, like emotional and feeling like, like it’s safe to be all of you. It’s safe to share your emotions. It’s safe to cry with your partner, feeling supported by them, feeling loved. And then I think another thing that’s really important is like not losing the play and the cheekiness, you know, like, Pinching, like I love, you know, when my partner’s doing something, doing the dishes or something, going up and pinching him on the bum or giving him a big cuddle or kissing his neck, you know, all of these little things create, like all of these little things add up to a big thing, right?

And that big thing is that you feel connected to your partner and therefore you’re more likely to open to sex. I think as well as parents, like something that we [00:22:00] experience is exhaustion, right? Like we are, it is exhausting being a parent, especially being a breastfeeding mom. Like you, yeah, it is, it can be really, really tiring.

And when we are tired, when we are fatigued, like We don’t even have the energy to have sex. Like it’s like, it shuts down our sex drive. It sucks. It shuts down our libido because we need to conserve energy to survive essentially. So I think nourishing yourself, like creating space to fill your cup. I know that if I haven’t created space for me for a couple of weeks that I’m not as available for intimacy and for like sexual connection with my partner, like I need to feel good within me, I need to also feel sexy.

I think that’s another thing that happens for women after birth. They go through a lot of bodily changes and a lot of women. Find it challenging to love their body, like their new shape of their body, or, you know, they’ve gone from being out of the house, dressed up with makeup all the time to being [00:23:00] at home covered in baby vomit, messy bun and a baggy tee and being, you know, often quite dirty a lot of the time.

And it’s like, it’s not conducive to feeling sexy. And so I know that, like, for me, like putting on a bit of makeup. You know, obviously not when I’m around the house, but like making sure that when I go out, I’m like making myself feel good. I’m not just putting on makeup to look good for other people. It’s like I’m doing myself up so that I feel good and I feel sexy and I step into that persona.

Yeah. And I think we’ve spoke about this a lot is like scheduling time for intimacy. I think it’s really important. Like we can’t in a long term relationship, we can’t rely on spontaneity and especially when you’re a parent, it’s just not a thing, unfortunately. I know that it feels sexy to have that spontaneity, but we can’t rely on it.

And I think when there is carved out time or time for intimacy, and that doesn’t have to be for sex, it could just be for connection. It could be for massaging each other. It could be [00:24:00] for. Blindfolding each other and centrally feeding each other like there’s so many ways and I know that. You know, when you said before, you’re like, what does that look like?

I’m like, Oh God, where do you even start? And it’s so hard to explain it through words. I think something that me and my partner just recently did is we ran a series of three online dates for parents at home that can’t get out to go for dates so that they can put their baby to bed and they can chuck on the TV or they put it on their laptop and 90 minute experience, which starts with.

a conversational piece. So building that emotional intimacy, yeah, that emotional foreplay, and then moving into some connection practices. And then at the end of it is moving more into sensuality practices. And I think, yeah, doing this, I get where that came from, where the inspiration for that came from is like, I want that.

Like we have dates at home. We try to have a date at home at least once a week. And that looks like. Doing different connection practices that we’ve learned. [00:25:00] To move, been doing together for years, but also I don’t want to guide that. I don’t want to have to go, Oh, what’s next? What are we doing next? Or shall we do this?

Like, I don’t want to lead that like I want to be guided through something that’s easy. I can just put it on my computer or my phone and watch it with my partner. Oh, I 

Melissa: love that idea. I’m definitely going to be doing those. That sounds amazing, babe. And Nick and I just recently celebrated 10 years 

Sara: together.

Wow. Congratulations. Thank you, 

Melissa: babe. And we are still like, so attracted to each other 

Sara: and 

Melissa: so in love, which is just so beautiful. And on top of that, we do have to make time for each other. We absolutely have to make time for each other. It has to be something each day for me. And that doesn’t mean an hour, even just that five minute emotional connection or whatever it is.

But you spoke to also [00:26:00] play. And I just wanted to highlight that again and underscore it because that often can be something that gets lost in relationships over long term and especially as kids come into the picture. But what we do every night after dinner is we put on two songs. And it’s usually the two same songs because Bambi loves these two songs.

And we dance in the kitchen together and the joy on her face and then the joy with Nick and I, it’s so beautiful. It’s something very simple to do. It takes a couple of minutes. That play, that intimacy, it’s really, really powerful. And we have to work at it, you know, all relationships. Need love, time and energy to flourish.

And your romantic relationship is no exception. Like I want my marriage to thrive, but in order for it to thrive, I have to nourish it. I have to give it the love, the time, the energy. [00:27:00] Everything that it deserves, otherwise it’s going to wilter away. And right now we are in a very full season of our life.

We are about to launch a brand new company and it’s full. There’s a lot going on and we’re building a home and we’ve got Bambi and all of these things. But it doesn’t matter. It actually doesn’t matter. Like it doesn’t matter how full your schedule is. You can still make time for each other. It is about prioritizing it and it is about getting creative and scheduling it in.

And, you know, for us, like. You spoke about spontaneity and I love spontaneity and pre kids, spontaneity was, it happened every week. There was something spontaneous that happened, which is beautiful. But what we do is we schedule in time for each other each week and it’s literally in our calendar. And then on top of that, if a spontaneous moment happens, then that’s a bonus.

But at least we’ve got those [00:28:00] times in where we have a date, you know, for us this season in our life, we love going for a walk together. So we will get our nanny to come earlier while Bambi’s still asleep in the morning and we’ll go for a walk together. And it’s beautiful, you know, 30 minute, 45 minute walk and it’s beautiful connection time.

We don’t take our phones. It’s really beautiful. So there are so many things that you can do. You just need to prioritize it. And you spoke about, you know, the health side of things and filling yourself up, which is such a huge piece of this. I remember I always love when I was doing the research for Openwide, I loved asking couples that had been together for a long time, like, what is their secret to a successful thriving relationship?

And there was a resounding couple of answers. That were quite common. One of them was respect. A big one was respect. Now, one girl said to me, I said, what do you think the secret to your thriving relationship and [00:29:00] sex life is? And she goes, health. And I said, what do you mean? And she goes, well, when I feel healthy and good in my own body and he feels healthy and good in his own body, we have amazing sex.

And I was like, 

Sara: wow, 

Melissa: no one had given me that answer. And so I just want to talk to that piece of self care and self love and filling ourselves up, which is so important as a mama in general. In how we show up 

Sara: to our partner. Totally. It’s, it’s a known thing, like healthier people have better sex and it makes sense when you think about it, right?

Like there’s more vitality, there’s more life forces, more sexual energy, there’s more drive, but for me as well, it’s about nurturing like my connection to my body and my connection to my pleasure and prioritizing that as well. And it’s definitely something that I don’t do enough as a mom. It’s hard, you know, like.

Again, I’m the same juggling a business, juggling a baby, juggling all the things, trying to keep [00:30:00] friendships and family relationships alive. And then my intimate partnership, there’s a lot, you know, and sometimes the first thing that can go is just you and your pleasure. And you, and what brings you joy.

And I think this is so common, especially for a mother. There’s so many little things that we can do. Like my partner and I are the same as you and Nick. We schedule in time for intimacy. Usually Monday night is date night and maybe once a month we might get a babysitter and go out, but most of the time we’re just connecting at home because we’ve just finished the first year of parenthood.

So that’s just the season of life for us. But something that I can do to prepare myself for that in a day is like. Making sure that I’m connecting to my sensuality, making sure rather than just sitting inside and eating, going, taking my bowl out, taking my son out into the yard and sitting in the sun and allowing myself to really receive the beautiful pleasure of feeling the sun on my skin.

You know, having a shower, putting my son to bed when I know that I’ve got at least like half an hour, having a longer shower and really [00:31:00] not just having a quick shower, washing my hair, but being slow, touching my body, touching my face, like enjoying it, like slowing down, finding the pleasure in the mundane, finding the pleasure in the small things, connecting to my senses.

And as I’m doing that, I’m all, I’m sort of like bringing them into my body, bringing that like yumminess, those. delicious senses into my body and allowing that to sort of light my sexual fire, you know, as well as doing things like sending my partner cheeky messages and, you know, what, telling each other what we’re going to do to each other later and things like that, building, building this anticipation as well as filling our own cups in the day.

And I know that when I do that, we’re more likely to have sex. We’re more likely. To have the time because we don’t need to spend half an hour preparing ourselves. There’s already energy. There’s already like life between us. Right. So it’s so much easier to drop into that space of pleasure and sex together.

But yeah, like I think I mentioned earlier, I know that when I haven’t made space. So I’m going to [00:32:00] do this for myself for a few weeks to go and do something. Go do a dance class. Go do a yoga class. Do something out of the house on my own for me. I know that like, I’m, you know, I’m, I’m snapping more at my partner on my kids.

I’m, I’m. I’m not myself, like I’m not feeling good about myself, not feeling good about me as a mother. I’m not feeling good in my body. And I know that when I feel good in my body and I feel good about who I am, I’m more likely to want to drop into my vulnerability and connect with my partner. I want to open and I want people to see me.

I want to invite people in. I want connection. So yeah, it’s really, really important. Um, I 

Melissa: love that. What about deepening your emotional and spiritual connection during intimacy and, you know, outside the bedroom? How can we 

Sara: do that? Um, such a good question. I think, I mean, I guess if your partner’s open to intimacy.

exploring more of the spiritual side of it, especially is like having a talk about that and maybe, you know, exploring some sort of tantric or sacred sexuality thing together, whether [00:33:00] that’s going to an event, getting a course online. I think one thing that is really helpful is that is just connecting to energy in your body.

You know, sex is not just this thing that we do is also an energy. Yeah. And we can. Explore. Moving that energy through our body, bringing it up like sublimating, up into our heart, into our throat, into our third eye, and connecting that way, or even bringing it down. Sort of like can, if you, you know, believe in God or spirituality, you can connect to that as something outside of you and bring that energy into your body as you’re making love.

And when it comes to emotional intimacy, I think just. Making sure that you have that emotional intimacy out of outside of the bedroom and you’re building that safety to, to be able to, I guess, bring that in and feel it in. Like I know when I first met my partner, I’m the type of person who, if I feel really safe with someone, I will often cry during sex or when I’m orgasming, like, because it’s a way of releasing.

Uh, stuck emotional [00:34:00] energy, you know, unprocessed trapped energy in our body will come out when we’re in our body, when we’re breathing, when we’re treating our lovemaking as self pleasure as this way to connect deeper to ourselves and to God and treating it like a meditation is the words I was looking for.

And things can release, you know, like rage might come up or sadness and grief might come out. And I know that when I follow that and I allow my eros, my sexual energy to move into those places that I can have a really deep, amazing orgasm. And sometimes if I’m crying, I like to call them crygasms, but there’s something.

Oh, there’s something deep in that. There’s like, there’s this release, but there’s also this connection because you’re making space in your body for more things, right? For more love and wisdom and, and creativity and all the things. So, but I know that at the start, like my partner hadn’t experienced that with someone and I, I didn’t really have that conversation or maybe I did, I can’t remember, but he was still a little bit surprised, like, [00:35:00] Oh, did I do something wrong?

You know, it’s. It can be pretty easily, easily to personalize that if someone just starts crying and that’s not something that you’ve experienced before. So I guess the safer we feel emotionally outside of the bedroom, the safer we are inside and the more emotionally connected we can feel. I think even just something simple like looking at your partner’s eyes.

gazing when you’re having sex. It’s so easy just to turn your head away and just to kiss or close your eyes and avoid that deep vulnerability. But when you’re like looking at someone and making love and moving together and attuning to their energy and the way they’re going to move, like there’s something so vulnerable and so.

Connected and deep and intimate about that. So I think that would probably even be some way to start is just trying to like catch your partner’s eyes and like holding it for as long as you can when you’re making love. 

Melissa: Mm, beautiful. And do that outside of the bedroom as 

Sara: well. 100 percent totally. Eye [00:36:00] gazing 

Melissa: is so beautiful.

Eye gazing and breathing together. We used to do that so much together. I’m going to do it tonight. I think it’s such a beautiful thing to do. But what about some of the challenges people experience, like, maybe one partner has. higher libido than the other, or maybe one person has experienced sexual trauma or, or things like that.

Like, how do we move 

Sara: through these things? Yeah. It’s so, you know, it’s so nuanced really. There’s so many ways and so many things, but I guess when it comes to sexual trauma, like knowing that it’s actually really, really common. And I think especially for women, even if women haven’t experienced some sort of.

sexual trauma from another person. They’ve maybe caused it from like, they’ve given it to themselves by saying yes and opening and having sex when actually their body was saying, and maybe even screaming no. So, you know, there’s so trauma is so nuanced. It could be something you could look at trauma as stuck emotional energy in our [00:37:00] body or a pattern that we’re sort of stuck in.

But I think definitely, I think the only way to have a healthy relationship to our own being and our, and our own sexuality, but also to our partner is to do the work and know that if you’ve experienced trauma, which we all have in some way or another, whether it’s tiny micro trauma or something massive, like, you know, sexual trauma and being raped, then like.

Um, you know, going and seeing a therapist, seeking some sort of professional help to move through that. And also openly speaking and talking to your partner about that so that they’re not personalizing it when you just, you know, shut down or disassociate during sex. And maybe talking to your partner about what actually happens to you so they can look for those cues.

Because I think what a, what a lot of people can do is maybe during sex it feels really good and then all of a sudden something doesn’t feel good. And rather than communicating that, they sort of, because. Their body goes into like a shutdown. Like it goes into a freeze response and they sort of just disassociate.

They just go into their head or they [00:38:00] just basically leave their body. And there’s so many signs that someone’s just associating when you’re having sex with them. So it’s maybe being aware of what’s happening in your body when, when that comes up and talking to your partner about that so that they’re aware of.

That and what to look for the science to look for. And then speaking about what you would need in those times. So if someone’s disassociating, I’d say slowing down, maybe like, you know, putting your hands on your partner’s heart and just like looking them in the eye and asking them to breathe with you or something like that.

Yeah. It’s just like something to help them come back into their body, connect them to their senses, bring their energy, their life back into their body. So maybe that’s. It’s completely, you know, yeah, maybe not just pulling out because I think that can also like traumatize someone, but just stopping, stop moving and like maybe even just co regulate by just holding them.

and asking them to breathe with you or talk to you or, I can’t remember what the other thing you, the first question, I just sort of ran with the trauma [00:39:00] one, but I think it was libido. Libido. Yeah, that’s right. Thank you. Thank you. It’s so common. Like it’s actually rare to have a couple that have the exact same libido.

And also knowing that our libido is going to change. And especially when we become parents, even for a man, like, Um, when we’re exhausted, we just, we don’t have like it shuts down that libido. So knowing that our libido is forever changing, but knowing that it’s really common for one partner to have a higher sex drive than the other and that’s okay.

You can make that work. It’s like, I think having a conversation about what’s your ideal number of times to have sex in a week or a month, you know, and if, and how can we bridge that gap so that we can both still feel fulfilled in that. Yeah. And I think sometimes. Also talking about the type of sex that you like.

These are little like questions and prompts that, um, we get couples to ask each other in our intimate date nights. Because I think they’re really important questions that [00:40:00] just get overlooked sometimes. Like I think sometimes. Maybe it’s been years or something that you’ve been with your partner or even 10 years plus, and all of a sudden you’re going, you’re realizing, Oh, I actually don’t like that type of sex that we have.

It’s hard to bring that up because you’ve been having that sex for the past, however long you’ve been together. So. Sometimes bringing that up and, and telling your partner, they might not react well, cause they’re like, what do you mean? Like you haven’t been enjoying our sex for the last 10 years, you know?

And knowing, as I said, that we’re all, we’re always forever changing and evolving. And especially when we become parents, like. It’s the biggest shift you ever experienced becoming a parent, and I think it really changes the way that, yeah, that we engage and connect to our sexuality, both for men and women.

There’s something called the Madonna Hall complex and the Hall Madonna complex. Have you heard of that before? No, tell me. Okay, so it, it’s like a psychological thing. So the Hall Madonna complex often happens. [00:41:00] So. In society, often a woman is looked at like a whore, right? Like a promiscuous sort of sexual being or a Madonna’s like a woman who is greatly respected.

Yeah. And then what can happen when a, when a woman becomes a man or if a man maybe witnessed her birthing their child, sometimes he can find it hard to sexualize her again because he all of a sudden sees her as this Madonna. He sees her as this woman that is. birthed their child, you know, and maybe he’s even seen the child come out.

And it’s like, this is the common thing, by the way. It’s like, it’s hard for a man to even look at the woman’s vagina again, the same way after seeing a baby come out, or they just find it hard to connect that. that person to, you know, an erotic sort of whore, like the naughty gal, you know? And so that can be really challenging for men.

It’s like, it just shuts down their sex drive. And all of a sudden they’re like, well, the attraction isn’t like, I love my partner, I respect them. But that energy isn’t there [00:42:00] anymore, or maybe this can happen in even little ways of like, I was talking to a friend about this the other day. It’s that when you’re pregnant, sometimes you got to have slower, more gentle sex because you’re carrying your child, right?

And then after you’ve had your baby, you don’t go back to having the rougher sex or talking dirty or doing the kinky things that you used to do. Like that, that eros, that same erotic platus isn’t there. And then that reversed as well. For a woman becoming a mother, like sometimes she finds it really hard to connect to that, that whore within her, that more slutty energy, that erotic energy, right?

It’s like, it’s just gone for her. So know that these are really normal things. And I think that there’s. There is many a ways through, but I think the first thing is just to talk to your partner about this. Like if you’ve got a child and you know that your sex hasn’t been the same since you’ve had a child, just openly discussing with your partner.

I know one, I did this with my partner. He did share with me that [00:43:00] like, you know, not so much that he, he couldn’t sexualize me anymore, but he wasn’t as. attracted sexually to that persona of me and a mother with a messy bun. And, you know, he, he’s like, there’s a lack of like effort being put in. And sometimes that’s hard for me to get in the mood.

And that was really hard for me to hear. I completely, even though I was like, Holding myself. I, there’s still a part of me that took that really personally. I’m like, you don’t think I’m attractive. Uh, and he’s like, no, I do. It’s just not there as much. Like the, there has to be more effort put in because we’re just, yeah.

In that mother persona, it’s like, you’re not that same erotic lady that. I met, you know, several years ago. So yeah, I think talking about it is the first step and then talking about, okay, what can we do? You know, in those, in those times where you’ve scheduled in intimacy, maybe like role playing, maybe like getting out the kinky outfits, like pulling out the sexy lingerie that in the bottom drawer of your cupboard that you haven’t [00:44:00] worn since before you were a mother or by going and buying something sexy for yourself that maybe now fits you or feels more appropriate for you.

And just. Yeah. And knowing that you can be an erotic woman and you can be respected, that those two things are not a separate thing. You can be both of them at the same time. Mmm. 

Melissa: Yes, babe. And, and like what I just keep hearing and like it’s flashing in my mind is like communication, communication, communication, all of these issues or anything that’s coming up can be resolved with just crystal clear communication as the first place to start.

And then, you know, getting support from a therapist or whatever it is, or someone like yourself. But it starts with that crystal clear communication, you know, getting honest with yourself and then sharing that with your partner. So good, hun. So good. I’d love to hear now, if you had a magic wand and you could put one book in the school curriculum of every high school around the world, [00:45:00] 

Sara: what book would you choose?

And this can be on any topic.

Oh, golly. I can’t think of a specific book. Like there’s been a couple of things that have popped in, but I think. I mean, there is so many books that I’ve read around pleasure, but I think something like around pleasure. I think when I, when I have been asked this question in the past about, you know, what should we bring to the kids is like, consent’s been a big one.

And I know Betty Martin talk like has a really good framework around consent. And I think, I think she has a book as well. I haven’t read it, but that would be good as well. But I think also, Teaching kids about pleasure as well as consent, like sex isn’t just about consent. It’s also about, uh, pleasure. So I think there’s not a specific book and the book pussy’s really cool, but I guess that’s not appropriate for boys.

Like they’re not going to get as much out of it, but yeah, if there’s a book out there, specifically on men and women’s pleasure, which is hard. It’s often for men or women. [00:46:00] Um, but yeah, pleasure and consent are the sort of the themes that I’m feeling that I think that would be really good in the school curriculum.

Absolutely. 

Melissa: Because we are not taught anything about consent or pleasure. Well, I definitely wasn’t in my schooling, but. That’s where it comes back to our parents, you know, we’re the ones that can teach them about consent, can teach them about these things because they’re not going to get 

Sara: it at school.

And on that note, if you do catch your child pleasuring themselves, please, please, please, please, even if it makes you feel uncomfortable, please stop and breathe before you react and do not shame and shut your child down. Because I think pleasure is so, being so shamed. Especially sexual pleasure, you know, it’s been so shut down and shamed, even as a kid.

Please teach them that their body and their genitals, uh, you know, is, is pleasurable and there’s nothing okay with that. That is beautiful and that is sacred. And there’s just an appropriate place to do that. [00:47:00] Yeah. Which is generally in your bedroom behind closed doors, not at the dinner table. Yeah, yeah, absolutely.

Melissa: There’s so much shame around it, like you said, and we don’t need to add to it. Like we don’t need to add to it. We need to inspire them to love their bodies, love their bodies so much. I think that’s such a huge piece of this. But also that consent piece and the pleasure piece, it’s all so important and they’re not going to get it in the schooling system.

So us as parents have to educate them and, and support them on 

Sara: this journey. Totally. Totally. It’s, yeah, it’s our duty as parents. 

Melissa: Absolutely. Okay. I’ve got three rapid fire questions for you now. Are you ready? 

Sara: Let’s do 

Melissa: it. What is one thing that we can do today for our 

Sara: health? Pleasure. Pleasure yourself.

You know, this doesn’t have to be masturbation. This is like, [00:48:00] go and touch your body, like give, listen to your body. What does it need in terms of pleasure and enjoyment and give it that. Absolutely. What is 

Melissa: one thing that we can do for 

Sara: more wealth in our life? Know our worth, I think, and if you don’t feel worthy, then work on that.

Work on your self worth. Yes, 

Melissa: absolutely. And what’s one thing that we can do for more love in our life? 

Sara: Again, give it to ourselves. I think, you know, you said that perfectly when you were talking about that story about your husband. It’s like, if we haven’t been taught how to receive love as a child, then it’s hard to receive love as an adult from people.

So, Yeah. Give yourself love and, and go to therapy and work on that. 

Melissa: Absolutely. Now, I absolutely love hearing about how people set themselves up for their days, their little morning routines, their rituals. Can you talk us through a [00:49:00] quote unquote typical day in your life? All of your little rituals you do, your little self love rituals, anything that you do in your day.

that you do each day that really makes a difference in 

Sara: your life. I love this. And I think like rituals are something when it comes to like self rituals, it’s definitely something that I have like dropped since becoming a mother. You know, not something that I do every day, but I do have a free ebook that you can get.

And it’s talking about intimacy rituals for busy parents. And these are little things like showing appreciation, sitting down at the end of the day and making sure that I say to my partner, how’s your heart today? How’s your mind? Like, let’s talk about the stress and the, and the day, but also let’s go deeper.

Like, how are you really, you know, is there anything that is between us that we didn’t get to talk about in the day? So those things, for me, I’m not a real morning person, so I’m really slow in the morning. So. I really like a slow morning with my [00:50:00] boy. I get up, I have a cup of tea, I sit there, I play with him and I want that morning for like at least an hour or two of just slowness.

You know, we don’t have to be on our phone. We don’t have to be quickly doing stuff and tidying up the house. Like that can all come later. Like. For me, I love a lifestyle where I get to have a slow morning with my boy. And then with the rest of the day, often I will work when my boy sleeps, or if I don’t have my boy, I’ll be working.

But some other things that we really like doing is we like going for hikes there. We do have some nice hikes around us. So we’ll go for a walk. We definitely play in the yard. And for me, something that is something that I really like to do, probably not every day, but at least every second day is I like to do a workout and I go to a mums and bubs fitness class and I also do that at home for myself.

And funnily enough, I’ve had some pelvic floor issues since having a baby and something that I do try to do every day is my pelvic floor exercises. And I [00:51:00] had a chuckle because obviously like I’m focusing on my vagina, like my pelvic floor, right? When I’m doing this. And so even though it’s something that I’m doing.

Like, it’s not like a pleasure thing. I can make it that. I’m like focusing and breathing into my yoni, into my beautiful genitals that births my baby every day. And I make this a ritual like that. I make this a connection ritual. 

Melissa: I love that. So beautiful. It’s so beautiful. There’s so many little things that we can turn into a beautiful ritual.

Like you were saying before, having a shower and just going a little bit slower. And really enjoying the shower. So much changes when you become a mother. We have to find those little moments, the joy in those little moments. We have to make those moments expand. I had a girlfriend two days ago. I went to lunch with a girlfriend and she said to me, she’s a relatively new friend, and she said, Oh gosh, your morning routine must be so [00:52:00] elaborate.

And so amazing. And I was like, well, not anymore. I mean, pre baby. Yeah. I would wake up, I would meditate. I’d work out. I’d go for a walk. I’d go for a swim. Like I’d spend the first like three hours on myself. Cause I wake up really early. It was delicious. I’m like, babe, no, like I have like two things I do in the morning.

I wake up, I always meditate for 20 minutes. Like that is a non negotiable for me. Like I always do that. And then I do some sort of movement. I’ll either go for a walk or I’ll do a little workout. That’s it. My workouts max 20 minutes. So like meditate for 20 minutes. I do a workout for 20 minutes. That’s it.

Yes. Then I drink water and I do all of those things. I said to her, it’s not that extensive, but for this season in my life, that’s what I’ve allocated for that time that I have in the morning and it will shift. It will shift, but for right now, that’s what works. So we just have to get creative as parents.

With our life, [00:53:00] for our self care, but also for our relationship. Once you have children, you have to get creative. You have to schedule things in, otherwise it just 

Sara: won’t happen. Absolutely. Yeah, I so agree. And like, I think some parts of motherhood can be so routine and sort of mundane if you, if you look at it that way.

And I think it’s about finding the joy and the pleasure in that. I know that that’s been something really important for me and my mental health is to like, focus on like. How much joy can I even have just doing the dishes and cooking my family dinner? Like cool, I might go, Oh yeah, okay, I got to cook dinner now.

But how nourishing is it for even me? Like it fills my cup to know that I’m feeding my family healthy, delicious, organic food. You know, like that in itself. So like focusing on that rather than I have to go cook dinner now, you know, like, yes, I get to go cook dinner. I get to go cook my family this beautiful meal.

So I think motherhood is all about that. It’s about finding the pleasure in the mundane. 

Melissa: [00:54:00] Absolutely. Absolutely, babe. I love it. This has been full of so many useful tips and tricks for people to start to explore within their own relationship. Is there anything else that you want to share? Any last parting 

Sara: words of wisdom or little key takeaways for us?

Hmm. The only thing that dropped in is like the word devotion, you know, it’s like looking at our relationship to ourselves, to our body, but also to our partner and to our children as. like devotion. It’s like, you know, how can I pour in this intentional love and how can I invest more of me and bring more of me into this?

Yeah. And that’s, what’s going to create a thriving relationship is like devotion, devotion to doing the work together. I don’t think it’s possible to have a healthy thriving relationship without doing the work and knowing it actually takes two people to create a pattern, but it takes one person to break a pattern.

So like maybe your partner, you’re sitting here [00:55:00] listening to this, being like, my partner is just not open to the work, keep doing the work for you. And when they see how much benefit it is. Doing for you. They’re probably going to want to come in and start going, Hey, what are you doing? You know? Absolutely.

Melissa: It’s so attractive. It makes people lean in. Absolutely. I love that, babe. You are helping so many people. I love the work that you’re doing. You are supporting so many couples. You are helping and serving so many people. So. I want to know how I and the listeners can give back and serve you today. 

Sara: I love that.

Yeah. So jumping on my website, checking out the intimate date nights. Um, I have just finished them live and I’m just setting them up as like an online course. So people can just buy it and then do it in their own free time. And yeah, grab my free ebook, if you like moments that matter. So this is intimacy rituals for busy.

Mums and dads, and they’re just little things that you can bring into your everyday life that take less than 10, five minutes a day, but can create [00:56:00] so much intimacy. And yeah, if you’re wanting to do the work and you’re ready to do that with your partner, then you can apply to work with me. Beautiful. And we’ll link 

Melissa: to all of that in the show notes.

Thank you so much for doing this work, for being the example, for being the embodiment of what it means to have a divine connected. Spiritual relationship, even after having babies. So thank you for doing this work. Thank you for being here and sharing all of your wisdom with us 

Sara: today. Well, thank you for having me.

It’s been such an honor to be on the show.

Melissa: I feel so inspired to take my relationship to the next level. To show up more for Nick. To. Do more random acts of kindness and love and touch and things like that during the day. And I’m going to make sure that we always have something scheduled into our week for [00:57:00] dates. It’s so important. So I hope this episode has inspired you to take your relationship to the next level.

And if it has, please subscribe to the show and leave me a review on Apple Podcasts because that means that we can inspire and educate even more people together. And it also means that I can continue to get epic people on the show, like Sarah. Now come over to Instagram at Melissa Ambrosini and tell me what you got from this episode.

I would absolutely love to hear from you. Now before I go, I just wanted to say thank you so much for being here, for wanting to be the best, the healthiest and the happiest version of yourself. And for showing up today for you, you rock. Now, if there’s someone in your life, your partner, maybe, that you can think of that would really benefit from this episode, please share it with them right now.

You can take a screenshot, share it on your social media, email it to them, text it to them, do whatever you’ve got to do to get this in [00:58:00] their ears. And until next time, don’t forget that love is sexy, healthy is liberating, and wealthy isn’t a dirty word.

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